


Small Creatures

by wordplay



Category: Space Camp
Genre: F/F, Yuletide, challenge:Yuletide 2007, recipient:Leyenn
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-12-25
Updated: 2007-12-25
Packaged: 2017-10-17 00:12:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,028
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/170859
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wordplay/pseuds/wordplay
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Thanks to jlh and danijo1 for prompt and immensely helpful beta reads.</p>
    </blockquote>





	Small Creatures

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to jlh and danijo1 for prompt and immensely helpful beta reads.

  


## Small Creatures

  
Fandom: [Space Camp](http://yuletidetreasure.org/get_fandom_quicksearch.cgi?Fandom=Space%20Camp)  
Written for: Leyenn in the Yuletide 2007 Challenge  
by [wordplay](http://yuletidetreasure.org/cgi-bin/contact.cgi?filename=41/smallcreatures)  


Thanks to jlh and danijo1 for prompt and immensely helpful beta reads.

The Space Coast of central Florida is flat and wet and filled with the nascent decay that characterizes any swamp, but it's also filled with people whose eyes are fastened on the sky. Situated just across from the Space Coast Regional Airport is Pinto's Lounge, a pile of white-washed timber listing to one side in the middle of a crushed shell parking lot. Families live down on Merritt Island, but this close to Kennedy it's mostly engineers, military, retirees, and a steady stream of tourists and so weeknights at the Pinto are quiet except on the night before a launch. On those nights honky-tonk spills into the parking lot and mixes with the cicadas till the sun starts to lighten the sky; the sheriffs overlook the liquor laws and the closing times, and the door stays busy, swinging open and shut.

Shell crunched under Tish's feet as she stepped out of the small Fit she'd rented this time around. The night air was thicker this far inland and she pulled off the sweater she'd needed at the beach. Four missions, four beach barbecues, because tradition still counted in the armed forces and, by extension, at NASA. She was glad that not everything seemed to carry over; Tish knew from her own work at Ames that NASA was too distracted by the science and the engineering to care about sexuality and Kathryn assured her that the astronaut corps was too proud to leave out one of their own. Kathryn had entered the corps as the youngest of the Penguins class ("and you know they mate for _life_ , Tish") and saw NASA as her family; Tish, who remembered all too well how Kathryn's Air Force "family" had behaved before Kathryn's early retirement, wasn't entirely sure about that. Four missions in and she lived with them for Kathryn, and because they were important to her own work (exobiologists were still mining the Mars data, and she wasn't _about_ to be left out of that), but the whole agency was still a bit too interested in its few good men and indifferent to its many capable women for her own tastes.

She pushed into the sweaty room, nodding to the few people she recognized; most of them were coming from the same party she'd been at, but she didn't pause as she headed to the bar. Kathryn refused to drink the night before a mission - her own first trip aboard the Shuttle had impressed upon her just how dangerous takeoff could be, after all - and since she was largely alone in that, Tish usually stuck to club soda herself in solidarity. But this was Kathryn's first mission as Commander, and she'd insisted that her entire team retire early and in seclusion, so Tish was on her own for the night. Liquor would help and, besides, she had a date to keep.

Kevin turned up 15 minutes later, just as she'd started her second Cuban Manhattan of the night. He looked good, smart and handsome and crossing the room while still engaged with whatever was coming from the Blackberry pressed to his ear. Their mission pin, his version of the one her freshman roommate at Berkeley had stolen from her so many years ago, winked from the lapel of his jacket; he always wore it when he was going to be around NASA people, proof that he wasn't just another rich and pretty face. He reached the bar, tossed his keys on it, kissed Tish on the cheek, took a sip of her drink and signaled to the bartender to bring him one of his own. Rolling his eyes at her, he continuing to nod and `uh-huh' for another few minutes before cutting off the speaker with an "OK, great, right, OK, talk to you tomorrow, great, thanks!" And finally, for once, the phone was turned off.

&&&&

The first time Tish wanted to kiss Kathryn, to grab her and taste her and keep a piece of her for herself, she'd thought she might be dead. She'd never been so afraid, and when the vibrations in the deck under her finally slowed and the shuttle got quiet and then Kathryn drifted in front of her, her face split in a grin and her eyes bright and her voice dreamy, Tish realized that she'd been an idiot to ever think Kathryn anything other than absolutely gorgeous - "understated", she'd once said. Right.

Three and a half years later, though, when what she wanted more than anything was to take Kathryn by her shoulders and shake her until she stopped being _a complete fucking idiot_ , it was hard to remember just how transformed Kathryn had been by that absolute joy, that sense of being in the exact place where she was made to be. Kathryn was pale when she showed up at Tish's door, and Tish put on a pot of the strong herbal tea she favored. She pulled out a box of cookies, too, because Kathryn looked thin and they needed fortification for this.

The story was slow to come at first, but unfolded pretty much as Tish had expected - an obnoxious guy, a foolish girl, too much alcohol, whispered charges of sexual assault, and Kathryn in the middle of it because of what people thought she did or did not see. What she didn't expect is what came after it: Kathryn, apparently even since the launch, had come to see herself as a fraud. She was convinced that at any minute she was gong to be kicked out of the Academy for being a discredit to the service. Her crimes, as she saw them, were unclear - not strong enough leadership, not decisive enough under pressure, having been a shitty girlfriend to Kevin, something about being both too feminine and not feminine enough - but what _was_ clear to Tish was the amount of bullshit Kathryn was laying on herself.

Kathryn bit her lip, continuing to worry her hands as she looked up at Tish through lowered lashes. "I just... I feel like I should have figured this out three years ago on Atlantis. I'm not a very good leader, but I keep putting myself into these positions where people expect me to lead them and I just...."

Tish had no idea what to say, but she had to come up with something to get that look off Kathryn's face.

"Kathryn, look, you fucked up. Everybody does - everybody fucks up, some people a lot. You think that it's about being a woman in a man's world. You're _supposed_ to think it's about being a woman in a man's world. And just because being boss and being bossy aren't the same thing, that doesn't mean you can't be both." Kathryn kept looking at her lap, worrying at one of her thumbnails with her teeth. Tish reached up and pulled that hand away from her mouth, holding it in both of her own while she kept talking. "But it doesn't mean that you're always going to fuck up, or that you're not a good leader. People trust you, they want to follow you, because you're special, you're so fucking special. You can do this, you just need to trust yourself again. You might be the ONLY person who can do this."

And then Kathryn had looked up at her with that beautiful smile splitting her face again and said, "You're really good at this supportive counseling thing. Did you read a book on it once?"

Tish smiled at her and kissed her hand. "Something like that, yeah."

Kathryn looked at her, smiled warmly, and leaned in to kiss her.

Her lips were warm from the tea and her hands were gentle around the callouses, which is how Tish knew again that just because something seemed too good to be true, that didn't mean she was actually dead.

&&&&

"How are the minions, then? I'm all about communication, Kevin, but that thing is ridiculous," Tish said, gesturing toward the Blackberry.

"The 'minions' are the best little true believers that Berkeley has to offer; they're your people, Tish. How's Kath holding up?"

"My people would never call you 'sir'. Oh, I think she's fine. I thought she was going to kick Kimbrough's ass tonight - she gave him the full glare and he fell into line pretty fast, but she thought she had that covered and so she's probably somewhere churning herself into butter over her perceived authority. She asked me to thank you for coming, though, and told me to try to gloat for her but not too obviously," Tish added with a smirk.

"Looks like a roaring success, then." Kevin glanced more than once at the ass of a passing young woman and Tish rolled her eyes at him. "This Kimbrough thing going to make her crazy?" he asked.

Tish rocked her head from side to side, thinking about Kathryn's struggles with her own natural authority. "Oh, she'll be fine. She's got it handled, and besides there's no traction there - Kimbrough's just an ass to everyone."

Kevin nodded. "And yeah, she's got plenty of experience with that."

"Oh yeah," Tish said, and she finished her drink in one long swallow. "She's been jerked around quite a bit. We both have."

&&&&

Almost as soon as Kathryn passed her comps and started booking time in the lab and on the scopes for her doctoral work, her base commander started making noise again, tired of being patient and agitating to get her in the field. The USAF was pretty forbearing about postgraduate work, more so than the other service academies, but the war in Iraq was heating up and this one they were determined to win from the sky; surface-to-ground missiles were doing a lot of work but the country's air commanders were eager to exercise the new targeting systems they'd just spent billions of dollars developing.

And listening to her talk about it, Tish knew that Kathryn wanted to fool around with them almost as badly, in part because the scanning and satellite technology they used had been one of the first technology changes on board the Space Shuttle since she'd piloted one. Kathryn was pretty sure she had a leg up on other candidates simply because of her own experience, but she would need flight combat experience too, and this was an opportunity. Tish had no desire to work in active exploration, she never really had, but Kathryn's vision for her own life hadn't wavered on the big points since she was seven years old.

So when Kathryn tells her they need to talk, Tish doesn't get angry on Kathryn's behalf about what an ass her commander is, jerking her around when she's so close already. She doesn't make the joke about what a girly thing that is to say, and she doesn't make the joke about how when she went for girls she thought she was going to get to skip the whole "sending Johnny off to war" experience, and she doesn't make the joke about scientists in foxholes. She listens to Kathryn and then she takes her to bed and uses her body to make sure Kathryn regrets leaving, because however unhappy this decision might make her, she's never going to be another obstacle to Kathryn's ambition. That's not her job, and she already knows that sometimes getting what you want means living with what you can stand.

***

When Kathryn finished her doctoral dissertation, the acknowledgments read:

 __

To my parents, who taught me how to reach for the stars.  
To AB and KD, who taught me to live with my limitations.  
To TA, who taught me how to live beyond them.

***

"I formally resigned my commission today."

Tish turned completely away from the computer at that and turned to stare at Kathryn, who leaned against the door frame with an unbearably smug grin on her face. In Tish's memory Kathryn is standing there sporting aviators, a leather jacket and one of those ridiculous white silk scarves, the kind that movie star pilots are always wearing, the kind that Kathryn's never owned.

"Damn. I thought you weren't going to do that until next year."

Kathryn shrugged, every inch the cocky pilot. "My time was served in August, even the education payback. We're ready to buy a house and I'm tired of worrying about what they'll do." She paused, looking down at the ground. "Hey, I'm hungry. You want dinner?"

There was more, Tish was sure of it, but she just nodded. "I could eat, and there's fish in the fridge. Light the grill and I'll finish up here."

Kathryn nodded at her and turned. She still had great hair, dammit, and that smile never got old. Over her shoulder she tossed out, "and I submitted the package to NASA today, too."

Tish logged off the university mainframe in a hurry and beat Kathryn to the kitchen.

***

Tish had just moved into her new office at Ames and was looking around the room a bit lost, sizing up the shelves for storage space and trying to figure out where the hell she was going to put everything. She'd been spending a lot of time with the fireflies lately, but they were vaguely creepy and were going to end up in the lab. There was a lot of space here, and it was looking like she was going to be lucky enough to end up with just the books, her personal copies of the recordings, and the musical instruments in the office, which would make it a very warm space and not too sterile. (In the end, she'd had to squeeze in a tank of ants and her scale model of the VLA in New Mexico, but she was calling that greenery and art, so that was fine.)

As she sat spinning in her chair and trying to look like she belonged there, her cell phone started to ring.

"Hey, what's up with you?" Tish asked.

Kathryn actually almost _squealed_. "I got news. I'm in. Tish, I'm in!"

Tish sat there stunned in the spinning office chair and its momentum carried her around until she was staring out the window at the California sunshine.

Kathryn didn't seem to notice the quiet. "I have to be in Houston in two weeks, and I have to talk to the chair here about how to handle my appointments, so things are going to be insane. Can you come to Houston with me to find an apartment there?"

Their house in California was a Craftsman-style bungalow with a two person shower and saltillo tile in the entryway and over the winter they'd built a brick fireplace off the patio. Two days previous they'd sat in the spa and bottomed out a bottle of wine while Kathryn ran her own little Messier marathon, using the early Spring skies to find as many of the catalogued items as she could. Tish could recognize them herself, of course, but she'd always loved hearing Kathryn talk about things she adored. "...and that's where the Eagle Nebula is. Pity it's so far away and there's so much light here. 'For small creatures such as we, the vastness is bearable only through love'," Kathryn had whispered in her ear just before she sucked the lobe into her mouth.  
The silence on the phone went on a bit too long, and Kathryn seemed to be realizing that, too.

"Tish. Hey, hey, Tish. It's for a month up front, and we can split time there. Once I'm trained I can work out of Ames; I won't have to stay at JSC full time." She was quiet. "Please be happy. I couldn't have had this without you; I wouldn't even want it without you. This is our life, Tish, this is everything we've worked toward, to have this and our house and our work and our lives."

And the thing is, Tish knew then that she meant it, that Kathryn saw her life of a piece - space and flight and work and Tish were all the same thing, bits of Kathryn's passion for living. She'd always been attracted to that intensely consuming drive, so different from her own. And there was a cost to that, sure, but she's spent every day since she'd met Kathryn encouraging her, feeding that, building her up and not letting her tear herself back down. They'd been alternately terrifying and saving each other almost from the time they met, and saltillo tile couldn't compete with the glories of that adventure.

&&&&

The morning of the launch was bright and a little breezy but everything looked good for the 10 am launch window. Tish was still sleeping off a night of drinking with Kevin when Kathryn called at 5, her voice tight and excited, and just before she hung up she told Tish, "hey, look in that stupid cell phone pocket of your bag. I left something in there for you. Love you, talk to you in a few weeks!" and then she was gone.

Tish stretched her way out of the bed and went to the little carry-on bag. It _was_ a stupid pocket, too small to be of much use at all, which must have been why Kathryn had chosen that as her hiding space. Wedged inside was a scrap of paper wrapped around a small fabric bag, and on it Kathryn had scribbled, "20 years ago we accidentally launched into an adventure, and then a few years later we managed to stumble into another one a little closer to home. One of them almost took our lives but the other has shown me the point of living them. Thank you for giving me back the stars." Inside the bag, pristine as it was the day Zach Bergstrom awarded one to each of them and bearing their names "FAIRLY AMBROSE" there with the others in small white letters, was their mission pin. Tish smiled at it, wrapped her palm around it, and glanced out the window. It was a beautiful day for a flight.

  



End file.
